Pages

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Four's a Charm - Let's start sewing

Are you ready for the next installment in the Four's a Charm baby quilt?

The first thing we're going to do is lay out our blocks. Select 36 charm squares/5" squares and lay them out in groups of four, for a total of nine blocks.

Take a step back from your blocks and take a good look. Are the prints and colors evenly spread out? Does any block or group of saqures catch your eye? Adjust the squares as necessary until the blocks look right to you. Now do yourself a huge favor and snap a photo of the layout. You can use it later as a guide if you get your blocks out of order.

Wow, this photo is quite out of focus. I'm blaming it on a very dark, cloudy day.

Time to get ready to sew these babies together. Starting on the top left block, I take the right square and flip it over so it's facing the left square. I start with the top two and then do the bottom two. I continue along left to right, one row after the next, until all the squares are stacked in sets of two.

flipping the right square over onto the left square

Take the stack to your sewing machine, keeping everything in it's original order.

Thread your machine/bobbin with the cotton thread. Attach your 1/4" piecing foot if you have one, or make any necessary adjustments or markings to sew a 1/4" seam.

Start chain piecing the square pairs. Make sure the squares are in perfect alignment before you sew a seam down the right edge. Once you've reached the end of the first square pair, sew a few more stitches without any fabric underneath the needle and then feed in your next square pair. Continue until all the pairs are sewn along the right edge. The last two squares pairs you sew make up the first block on the upper right side of the quilt (if you followed my directions).

Head over to your ironing board with the long chain of squares, a pair of scissors, and pins. Snip off the last two square pairs from the chain.

Set the seams by pressing them flat just as they are.

Next, press one seam over to one side (typically towards the darker fabric). Press the other seam in the opposite direction.

Determine which pair is the top of the block and which is bottom half. Place them right sides together, nesting the center seams. Pin at the center and put another pin on each end.

Repeat with the remaining pairs until all nine blocks have been pressed and pinned.

Chain stitch the center seams using the same method as above.

Head back to the ironing board. Set all the seams by ironing them flat, just as they are, then press the center seams open.

Congrats! Your nine blocks are done. In the next installment we will square up our blocks and sew the sashing and the borders.